


I'll Be The Libertine

by Ailorian



Category: Sherlock - Fandom, johnlock - Fandom
Genre: D/s lifestyle, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-14
Updated: 2014-02-14
Packaged: 2018-01-12 09:16:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1184502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ailorian/pseuds/Ailorian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I have ‘bbjkrss' to fill their request for a fic.  Their prompt is: “Anything inspired by “Collar Full” by Panic at the Disco, D/s verse, sub!Sherlock”. Their preferred rating(s) is(are) T, M, E. Remember, prompts are only the basis of your work - it is up to you as to how you interpret them.<br/>The genre(s) they have requested is(are): Angst, UST, Fluff. If more than one is listed, you do not have to feel obligated to fill all of them; once again, it is up to your discretion and interpretation.<br/>Their deal-breakers are: ”None”. Please refrain from incorporating these into your creation. They have specified that they are fine with spoilers.</p>
<p>~Sherlock invites John over under the pretense of needing his Dom but with the intentions of taking the blame for Mary's death~</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'll Be The Libertine

**Author's Note:**

> I can't decide if I should admit defeat and tell the Johnlockchallenges people to consider me a failure. I feel like if I post this today, I might be able to get away with using the ~three day late period to write a "second" chapter where I actually get to the interesting part but I just don't know what to do. 
> 
> Dear prompter: If you like this and where it is going I will finish it for you but if you hate it and I missed what you were looking for by a huge margin (which I suspect I did) I'm truly sorry and would be willing to try again if you would like to provide more specific directions. I'm sorry and I love you. Happy Valentines Day <3

Sherlock feels nothing over Mary’s death - the end of a devious and destructively selfish woman, a culmination of merciless training, suspension of punitive damage, and avarice that left only self preservation and the compulsive attainment of that which she covets. After all of the time and planning that went into their collective attempt to secure the safety of John’s unborn daughter, the greatest tragedy of Mary’s death is that she gave the good doctor a legitimate reason to grieve. That is not to say that John had never loved Mary, though Sherlock was hardly an expert, it is only to clarify that John had been surrounded by manipulative sociopaths long enough to know he would never win by playing fair.

The best laid schemes of mice and men could not account for the rare occurrence of laziness in the universe. All of the training and skills and perfected reflexes are useless in the face of random happenstance. But, in perhaps this exclusive case, it matters not how or why. It is so obvious that Sherlock does not even wonder, and John is too cocooned in his mourning to bother with much of anything, and yet--

It takes two hours for John to answer, and Sherlock bides his time with the patience of a chemist. John’s perfection in loyalty is only highlighted by the effort put forth to resume his responsibilities as Sherlock’s dom upon the sleuth’s return. In the beginning, Mary had been entirely forgiving, understanding, supportive even of the time that the two of them needed together. Even in the wake of Sherlock’s zealous attempts to distance himself from the Watsons and in Mary’s mild attempts to monopolize the doctor’s time, there was no refusal to a request for company or attention, no matter how subtle or subconscious or fleeting in its insistence.

John is a self effacing, counter intuitive, painfully moral, traditionally minded martyr, and menace to himself. He is a stinging wound and the salve to soothe it, at once sensitive and impervious. He is all things domestic, practical, empathetic and kind, with a sliver of blood lust that years spent in the Middle East had not quenched. A righteous, protective, self reliant, inescapable drama that requires as constant of a stimulus as Sherlock's racing mind. Unremarkable John, who made friends easily and shallowly, a soldier with trust issues that left his life in the hands of others, and took life in defense of others, who held life in a surgeon's trembling, nerve damage hands. John was never a shadow, no matter how well he followed and chased and sat silently with only the purpose of directing one toward the light. John is a beacon, a compass and sextant, a north star and a candle in the window. He entered one's world with a small, inconspicuous greeting, radiating a timid warmth that one hardly acknowledged on a conscious level, but was so important, so powerful, that his subsequent absence left a perfect John-sized hole at one's side, in any room he vacated, in any company he had kept.

No matter how unpredictable John managed to be at times, there were parts of him that Sherlock knew without thinking, without observing. Instinctual, intuitive, known on a level that Sherlock rarely trusted with data. Sherlock Holmes believed what he could see, and it was not until Captain John H. Watson, MD that he had ever had cause to believe what he /felt/. Some of these known parts made the John-shaped hole beside him swell with warmth, and others made the John-shaped hole grow cold and sharp around the edges.  
   
The thing that drew people like Sherlock Holmes and the woman who assumed Mary Morstan's space in the world to John Watson was not his love of danger, or marksmanship, or his ability to stumble over explanations that poets have been providing alternatives to for centuries. It was the easy and unwitting manner in which he loved. Unburdened by those same trust issues and antisocial tendencies in which he sometimes cloaked himself, pushed to a mindful solitude in the wake of his losses and sufferings, John loves a bit fastidiously, almost exclusively, irrevocably, wholly, entirely, for no reason, and he continues to allow himself to be spurned and hurt and bullied rather than turning away from his tolerant nature.

There was a time when Sherlock believed John was able to absolve the right people of any sin, misdeed or shortcoming, subject of course to an appropriate amount of time, rationalization, and the only fear to which John was truly capable of succumbing  - that is, perhaps to say, his only shortcoming - in his otherwise effortlessly courageous and frequently amiable interaction with the many dangers and tragedies to which human life could be so predictably subject. That fear, of course, was being useless, ineffectual, unnecessary or unwanted, and it was a fear that the good doctor had spent most of his life desperately trying to avoid actualizing, despite its obvious inaccuracy.

When John arrives, it is already under the weight and solemnity of ceremony. Despite a comfortable and satisfying familiarity between them, in these moments of need they chose unconditionally and implicitly to proceed with ritual, predictable and without variation. The doctor and soldier toes off his shoes with practiced ease, slipping his coat down his arms at the same time before setting it on the hook behind the door.

"I know it's not the best time. I'm sorry."

"Be quiet." John tells him, sternly, his commanding tone in place until Sherlock ends the scene. "Don't apologize until you've done something wrong."

Sherlock knows that social niceties dictate he should express condolences for John's loss, for the failure that they tangentially share, for the inconceivable pain it has caused his blogger, but it will only upset the self effacing man further to hear anyone else even attempt to assume the responsibility he not only feels but craves, the blame which John cannot fathom belonging to any god or even the seemingly chaotic rhythm of the universe. Tonight is not about blame, however, as Sherlock has no intention of begging absolution, or forgiveness, or even offering sympathies. It is good and right that John is at Baker Street once more, if only for tonight, no matter the cost.

"On your knees." John murmurs, the chime of the kettle following the click of one cup touching the counter before he reaches for the tea tin. Sherlock rises with practiced grace from his chair, never the slithering, modest, or hesitant obeyor. As John lifts the kettle to pour, Sherlock falls to his knees as if tossing himself upon an altar or pyre, an audible thump resounding through his thighs, muffled only by the thin carpet overlaying the hard wood beneath, and the canvas tarp which he has placed there.

Sherlock is a difficult patient, discomforted neither by his exposure or bondage, more than capable of escaping and negating any mechanism which John might condone using, and without regard to threats of violence, pain, or the withholding of stimuli. His common but inconsistent decision to wear bedclothes is born of convenience rather than the expected intention of vulnerability. It is not the escape of being overwhelmed he seeks -a chemical cocktail specifically designed to protect him against shock and agony purposefully drawn forth by an expert whip hand- not entirely, anyway, but the controlled application of what he hates to crave. First, though, is surgery.

John prepares tea he will never drink, placing the familiar blue striped cup with a proper setting of sugar and cream in the matching china set on the table beside his chair. It will be cold by the time he is concerned with the tray again, but it is a necessary detail, if only for the moisture and scent it adds to the air as it steams and steeps itself away. The function, habitual, bridging on reverent in its ritualistic nature, licks at Sherlock like a Pavlovian chime, kissing him with the sort of analgesic spritzer, and inspiring the barest hint of opiate-mimicking endorphins. It’s a pale and textureless shadow of what will take place, and Sherlock shifts to relieve himself of the itching anticipation.

While Sherlock watches the steam curl out of the cup, following steps in a dance born of heat, motion, and math, John retrieves a wood and brass chest from the sleuth’s room. It’s a small chest, the lid curved and bowed in a proper half circle, laid with hammered metal that hasn’t been polished since its purchase. Inside tarnished edges and layers of scratched and painted wood there lies seven pristine, sanitized, shining, sharpened scalpels, each with a unique curve.

There had been a time when Sherlock considered a ring or a collar, in the simple but anxiety inducing errand of selecting a manner in which he might convince John not only of his sincerity but of his unwavering desire to have the stocky little army doctor be his. Not in the manner that most expected, that John so frequently rebuffed suggestions of his interest, but in this. A single man amongst a world’s population in whose hands Sherlock could entrust not only his life but his mental health, emotional stability, and direction of morality. After their encounter with the Woman, Sherlock lost interest in the sting of a whip or crop, but it wasn’t until their stint in Baskerville that the consulting detective found himself craving the escape of a different kind. Even Lestrade’s team of volunteers could not locate the relief- and guilt-inducing container that John pulled free by mistake. After allowing the good doctor to properly dispose of the offensive solutions, accompanied by his boisterous and thrilling admonishments, Sherlock devised a new manner in which to fill his treasure chest of self-medication.

Seven scalpels resting in a conformed bed of black velvet, with an impressive supply of replacement blades tucked beneath the insert, which Sherlock had left on the kitchen counter, positioned carefully between kettle and toaster, without direction or notice, for John to comprehend and acknowledge, or set aside without regard. The look on his doctor’s face at the realization was worth misplacing the solar system for the space it occupied in the consulting detective’s secret garden - a framed photo recounting the moments of surprise and uncertainty set on the long and winding hall of shelves behind the simple wooden door marked simply John. Always the enigma, John hesitated only a moment after it became clear what Sherlock was asking, pledging his time and efforts to Sherlock’s well being without thought for a future where it was different, without consideration to the women he continued dating, and their ominous but fledgling potential. When Sherlock died, it never occurred to him that John would branch out in his newly acquired freedom, released from a bond that served him poorly. Despite knowing what a burden he was, Sherlock failed to predict John’s sufferings, just as he failed to predict John’s recovery, and the path on which such recovery would take him.

At the table in The Landmark, Sherlock had disregarded Mary’s presence entirely, hardly bothering even to take a proper look at her until she offered assistance - a rare bird, indeed. Two things became very clear, very quickly. The first of which was John’s obvious interest in something that Sherlock could never be, a life and a partnership the likes of which Sherlock could never supply, and which would never truly satisfy the soldier. The second was that Sherlock would never survive without John’s companionship, and perhaps not surviving was precisely what he deserved.

There had only been one session since his return from the dead, after counting each minute of the passing hours between locating the Watsons’ neighbor and John’s arranged arrival. After everything that he endured, pitiful and glancing in the shadow of his time spent unraveling Moriarty’s web, it was only a day into his recovery that Sherlock called upon John in the manner to which he had once been entitled. Somewhat to the sleuth’s surprise, John came, and there was clarity once more.

Tonight was as much about John as it was Sherlock. Despite the presumptions regarding his kind, it was a universally unspoken understanding that Sherlock held all the proper power. In consigning himself to John’s care, Sherlock had in fact tethered the broken and surly soldier to himself, a leash with a handle and hook, both in whose hands each lay was an illusion perpetuated outside of their private sanctuary by poor comprehension and improper regard for the honor and trust associated with such a bonding. There was nothing John could do without Sherlock’s express consent or direction, except refuse to arrive, and despite the dom’s evident anger, frustration, silent accusation, and self admonishment, he was still here, still willing, still more dedicated to Sherlock’s caretaking than himself.

Tonight it would vary slightly, sidestepping the usual treatment in favor of John’s healing, even if Sherlock could only offer himself in recompense for the heartache he had caused in his departure and then worsened with his return. Doctor Watson would never listen to even the suggestion that he was in need of, let alone entitled to, some proper grieving, but Sherlock knows his blogger well enough to trick the man into the comfort he needs.

As John returns, the chest tucked beneath his elbow since it is just large enough not to fit in one hand, Sherlock lets his gaze flicker invasively away from the curling steam and over the doctor’s revealing form. Two days since he slept properly, once again ravished by the nightmares that plagued him during their first few months at Baker Street. There was early evidence of similar nightmares when Sherlock had first returned, devastated by all that he could read - and not read - in the moments leading up to his reveal, and even in the days following. If ever John had been confusing, he was utterly incomprehensible then, even with all that could be known about him in a glance he continued to defy pattern and proxy, defeating Sherlock’s attempts to make amends at every turn while the sleuth navigated his new efforts at socialization without proper direction or discernable results.

Without preamble, John sets his free hand on the back of Sherlock’s neck, pressing firmly forward until the sleuth’s hands move instinctively to protect his face from impact, catching his balance on outstretched palms. John’s fingers remain, clamped to immobilize without pain, long enough to inform Sherlock that he is not to move. His head hangs between slightly relaxed shoulders, his chin kept parallel to the floor, knowing he won’t be able to keep it up soon. Sherlock’s table, Syrian, octagonal, and antique, is dragged from its place beside his chair until the brunet can barely see it past his own shoulder. The chest is gently set on top, it’s lock flicked open and lid lifted.

Sherlock fights to remain still, despite his ability to go days without talking or moving should the mood come upon him, struggling beneath the weight and power of anxiety he had so long ignored in his search and lust and craving for clarity. The sound of air escaping and the shift of leather alerts Sherlock to John’s appropriation of the detective’s chair. A dip of his head reveals one socked foot bouncing, one knee resting over the other while John watches him from an angle unseen, no doubt with his chin propped on one fist while stormy gunmetal blue eyes dart shamelessly over Sherlock’s prone form. Even with his bedclothes and dressing gown, Sherlock already feels exposed, imagining the brush of chilled air dancing across his oversensitized skin. John knows how well Sherlock’s imagination responds to the barest hint of stimulus; a mind designed and trained to regurgitate information upon request, to provide answers where others had questions, to be thorough and detail oriented. Apathy had once protected him from the hazards of such an intellect, but the shining, enthralling conductor that was John Watson had tricked him into clouding his pristine judgement with empathy and tolerance. The longer John waits, the less Sherlock can ignore, and he is trembling within the hour.

The tea sits cold by the time John stands; sweat drips from Sherlock’s brow and he pretends the salty perspiration is not joined by tears while his arms and thighs shake under the effort of maintaining his position for so long, despite a rather impressive physical endurance. After several bouts of torture and attempts on his life, Sherlock is almost surprised by his reaction to John’s silent and steady influence, but surprise is for those weaker and less intelligent than him, and tonight is not purposed with his recovery or redemption, but with John’s release.

“Undress.” The command is soft, monotone, but no less compulsory than a shouted order while John’s nearly tangible dominance rolls over Sherlock in warm and undulating waves. As subtle and invasive as the man, John’s ephemeral influence paints one as easily as butter over hot toast, and is just as difficult to remove.

Like a rehearsed ballet, Sherlock makes to rise from his cat and cow pose, and John responds by placing his hand at the back of the brunet’s neck; the same pressure and grip as before in his placement, now at the end of a stiff arm and locked elbow. After a pulse-stuttering moment of minor panic -a frustrating psychological response to physical stimulus that refuses to be deleted- Sherlock relaxes, intentionally tensing his abdomen to take his weight and hold the position while his hands lift to strip off his dressing gown. When it is obvious he knows to remain where and as he is, John releases him, stepping away so Sherlock can remove his shirt as well. The trousers and pants are more difficult, but not as difficult as a proper suit might be, and rather than lift his legs, Sherlock shoves the fabric down to rest on top of his calves. There is nothing of import to this evening further than his lowest vertebra anyway.

Seven scalpels ascending in thickness of the blade from front to back, stainless steel handles with textured grips to prevent the surgeon’s hands from slipping, and though Sherlock tends to doubt the aptitude of those around him, there is a confidence in John that casts aside such details as frivolous, not in the information they lend, but in the purpose they suppose to serve.

There is a series of shuffling noises, during which Sherlock has no doubt John pulls a pair of wax-paper wrapped, sterile surgical gloves from his pocket, the powdered surface slipping against skin, calloused but growing softer in the soldier’s grudging and self-compelled domesticity; including the special moisturizing dish soap the Watson household used. A moment later, the steel on velvet makes a soft and fleeting sound as John finally retrieves one tool; the thickest blade, which Sherlock catches a glance at with his head hanging down, chin tucked against his chest while his already damp fringe curls toward his forehead, clinging to his neck and ears.

The touch of an antibacterial cloth is cold, and Sherlock flinches slightly while John wipes him down from shoulders to waist. The crisscrossing scars on his back have a myriad of origins - under the tools and experience of interrogators from several foreign governments and paranoid gangs at the edges of Moriarty’s web. It was imperative that Sherlock avoid divulging the nature of his efforts, so it had been necessary to escape on his own, rather than beg the assistance of diplomacy.

John discards the cloth into the waste bin behind him, the small one taken from the bathroom, sanitized and with a fresh liner. Tonight, John is a surgeon - clean, accurate, precise, and controlled. Always so carefully in control. A lifetime of hurts, losses, tragedy, abuse, self righteous rage, and well deserved sorrow, swallowed and ignored and bandaged with quick smiles and calm tones, reminding himself over and over that he doesn’t deserve to feel that way. This is the part that Sherlock understands. The suppression, the refusal, the belief that it is better served to be disregarded. It is a lesson learned over so many years, that could take twice as long to unlearn, that might never be unlearned. A lesson that shapes personalities, manipulates decisions. Sherlock may not be in any position to comment on such a mindset, wisely self aware of his own demonstrative shortcomings; he may not even be capable of solving this, of fixing John, of making anything better, but he owed John the effort of an attempt. Sherlock Holmes owed John Watson quite a lot, in fact, and he suspected that he would have to trick his blogger into accepting any of it. His only hope was that John would still want his company when it was finished.

The blade of the scalpel is sharp enough to slice almost without sensation. John, while confident and meticulous in his own stability, places a hand on Sherlock’s back to steady them both before pressing the tip to the center of Sherlock’s largest scar. In the center of his back, diagonal at a thirty five degree angle from his spine, a thick split under several strikes of an iron tipped lash. This is the premise for which Sherlock has drawn John back to Baker Street. In those moments when pulling his shirt across his shoulders reminds him, or when lifting his arm to point, or wave, or hail a cab, or surrender, when even reaching for a beaker from the shelf reminds him of harsher, broken days. Better to have those scars as a result of John’s skilled hands - tracing marks left by nameless sadistic strangers with the careful affectionate hands of his best friend. Better to recall the evening when John smelled of sage and lemon salt and chicken grease, when they ate stir fried vegetables with dark meat in a white sauce and drank cheap cabernet trying to replicate champagne. Better to think of John, a smile below gunmetal blue eyes, wrinkling slightly in the corners while he softly snorts out a laugh. Better to recall John’s hands on his body, John’s quiet breath in the silence, John’s soothing voice in the aftermath.

Pain is the most common reason that people seek medical attention, but pain is actually hard to define because it's a subjective sensation. Pain perception, or nociception, from the Latin word for ‘hurt’, is the process by which a painful stimulus is relayed from the site of stimulation to the central nervous system. There are several steps in the nociceptive process: contact with stimulus, reception, transmission; pain center reception, a clear and concise path from the origin to the brain, so quick as to be considered instant. Nociception uses different neural pathways than normal perception. With nonpainful stimulation, the first group of neurons to fire are normal somatic receptors. When something causes pain, nociceptors go into action first.

Sherlock bites his lip as the blade goes deeper, slicing through scar tissue into untouched flesh, undamaged nerves, sweeping in long, defined lines while John flays him open like a fish on the table.

Endorphins are among the brain chemicals known as neurotransmitters, which function to transmit electrical signals within the nervous system.Stress and pain are the two most common factors leading to the release of endorphins, which interact with the opiate receptors in the brain to reduce perception of pain and act similarly to drugs such as morphine and codeine. In contrast to the opiate drugs, however, activation of the opiate receptors by the body's endorphins does not lead to addiction or dependence. In addition to decreased feelings of pain, secretion of endorphins leads to feelings of euphoria, modulation of appetite, release of sex hormones, and enhancement of the immune response. With high endorphin levels, we feel less pain and fewer negative effects of stress.

Sherlock is shaking from exertion and agony, drenched in sweat and dripping blood onto the canvas tarp beneath him, when John stills, removing the blade and his steadying hand. 


End file.
